Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Press Pause

by Gabi Pinto-Coelho

America:
the land of the free and the home of the stressed. Don’t get me wrong, I am
incredibly proud and grateful to be an American, and stress is not a uniquely
American experience. But let’s face it, our workplaces promote a culture of
more-is-more, dog-eat-dog, do-it-all, and by the way, your request for vacation
has been denied. This doesn’t even take into account our often equally
over scheduled home lives with household chores and errands, care giving
responsibilities, and the ever-growing “wish I could get to” list. It can
easily feel as if we are living in the middle of a hurricane, and the only
thing we can do to stay in the eye of the storm is to keep doing more, and
faster, and more efficiently. Gotta be one step ahead.

As a
Type A person, this is how I have lived the majority of my life. To-do lists
are my bread and butter, and for me, there is nothing quite as rewarding as crossing
off tasks. And while this can certainly be a virtuous quality, I have begun to
notice how it is a shortcoming. The constant need to “do” and “get things done”
can leave me with a feeling of hyper-vigilance - Have I done everything I need
to today? Can I get ahead on anything for tomorrow? Did I forget something? What
if I forgot something? Living in this state of heightened stress can lead to a
host of problems, which is why I am grateful for the practices of yoga and
meditation. If the idea of sitting still on a cushion for 20 minutes or bending
and twisting in a 90-minute yoga class makes you cringe, fear not. There is a
simple and quick way to practice that peaceful feeling that follows a
meditation or yoga session.

Whether
it feels like it or not, you have the opportunity to “press pause” on your life
whenever you would like to do so. No, I am not talking about literally stopping the
passage of time, a la Hiro Nakamura in the TV show Heroes. Instead, I am
talking about taking a moment in the day to notice the swirl of activity,
thoughts, and emotions, and choose to intentionally pay attention. Notice that
this practice is about attention -
not about judging, storytelling, wishing things were different, grasping onto
something, or pushing something away. It is just about arriving where you are,
exactly as you are. So how exactly do you “arrive,” especially when you feel
like you are on a high-speed carousel that you cannot escape?

Well, you have some
options:

·Pause
by noticing the physical sensations in your body. You can do this
seated, standing, laying down, walking, doing whatever.

·Pause
by noticing the movement of the breath in and out of the body.

·Pause
by noticing the thoughts and emotions as they pass across the mind. This
one is a little trickier, so I recommend working with the body and the breath
first. Especially when working with the mind, imagine that you are cloud watching
- sit on the sidelines and observe as the thoughts and emotions arise and
dissipate on their own.

The key
to pressing pause is to just observe and bring the mind back to your focus
(body, breath, or mind) each time your mind wanders. The practice is not about
having an empty mind or only positive experiences - the practice is about returning to this moment without judgment over and over again. If
your mind wanders 100 times while you are watching the breath, bring the
attention back 100 times. That’s it. This practice might last 2 minutes or 5
minutes... it’s entirely up to you. Simple, but definitely not easy. You might be
surprised how it makes you feel.

You
might be thinking: well, who is going to get all this stuff done when I am
“pressing pause”? What if something urgent comes up? First of all, it is
important to trust that world will not devolve into pure chaos if you take a
few minutes to arrive in the present. Second, the act of pressing pause is
equivalent to a mental “reset” button, and it allows you to return to your
tasks more focused and more productive than before.

We are so focused on
getting things done that we convince ourselves that “just another hour of work
will really make a difference.” In reality, your push to be productive slows
you down and gradually smothers your intellectual and creative capacities.
Third, pausing is important not only in those routine moments of stress, but
perhaps even more important in times of crisis.

Research has documented how
stress affects our decision-making abilities, and, unsurprisingly, when we are
stressed out, we don’t always take the best action. In crises, our fight-or-flight
instinct kicks in and we tend to react rather than respond intelligently. Pressing
pause actually helps us respond well in those high-stakes situations.

The next
time you feel that “swirl” in your life - of activity, of thoughts, of emotions
- take a moment and press pause. See what happens.

About Me

The Coleman Institute, the Advanced Center for Addiction Treatment, is recognized as one of the most successful and innovative outpatient accelerated detox centers for addiction treatment in the country with 10 offices in the U.S.
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